Transcription of UNIT 2 THE ELECTROMAGNETIC SPECTRUM
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Like expanding ripples in a pond after a pebblehas been tossed in, ELECTROMAGNETIC radiationtravels across space in the form of waves. Thesewaves travel at the speed of light 300,000 kilo-meters per second. Their wavelengths, the dis-tance from wave crest to wave crest, vary fromthousands of kilometers across (in the case ofthe longest radio waves) to fractions of ananometer, in the cases of the smallest x-raysand gamma rays. ELECTROMAGNETIC radiation has properties of bothwaves and particles. What we detect depends on themethod we use to study it. The beautiful colors thatappear in a soap film or in the dispersion of lightfrom a diamond are best described as waves.
tiny that scientists use another unit, the electron volt, to describe them. This is the energy that an electron gains when it falls through a potential difference, or voltage, of one volt. It works out that one electron volt has a wavelength of about 0.0001 centimeters. X-rays range from 100 elec-tron volts (100 eV) to thousands of electron volts.
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